The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1887-03-03

/ or God, have kept those three vows 10 THIS
time. soon after that became Christian, and
that decided my fate for time and for eternity"
/ Another captive of this great Christian
delusion! There goes Saul of Tarsus on
horseback at full gallop. Where is he
goinga To destroy all Christians. He
wants no better play-spell than to stand and
watch the hats and coats of the murderers
who are massacreing Gods children. There
! goes the same man. This time he is afoot.
Where is he going now? Going on the road
to Ostia to die for Christ. They tried to
whip it out of him; they tried to scare
it out OF him; they thought they
would give him enough OF it
by putting HIM into a windowless dungeon,
and keeping him on small diet, and deny
ing hum cloak, and condemning him as
criminal and bowling at hun through the
street. But they could not freeze it out of
him, and they could not sweat it out of
him, and they could not pound it out of
him, so they tried the surgery Of the sword,
and one summer day in 66 he was decapi-
tated. Perhaps the mightiest intellect of
the 5000 years of the world existence was
hoodwinked, cheated, cajoled, duped by
the Christian religion.
All! that is the remarkable thing about
this delusion of Christianity, it overpowers
the strongest intellects. Gather the crit
les, secular and religious, of this country
together, and put vote to them as to
| which is the greatest book ever written,
and by a large majority they will say
Paradise Lost" Who wrote Paradise
Losta' One of the fools that believed in
this Bible, John Milton.
Benjamin Franklin surrendered to this
delusion, if you may judge from the letter
he wrote to Thomas Paine, begging him to
destroy the cage of Reason in manu-
script and never let it go into type, and
! writing afterward, in his old days: "Of
this Jesus of Nazareth have to say that
the system of morals He left and the re-
! hgion He gave us are the best things the
world has ever seen or is likely to see.'
Patrick Henry, the electric champion of
that he says: "The book worth all other
books put together is the Bible"
| Benjamin Rush, the leading Psychologist
and anatomist of his day, the great medical
sclentist-what did he says 1.-THE only
true and perfect religion is Christianitya"
Isaac Newton, the leading philosopher of
his time-what did he saya That man, sur
rendering to this delusion of the Christian
religion, cried out: 1.-THE subimest phi
losophy on earth is the philosophy Of the
Gospel"
David Brewster, at the pronunciation of
whose name every scientist the world over
bows his head-David Brewster SAID: so,
this religion has been a great light to me,
a very great light all my days"
President Theirs, the great French
statesman, acknowledged that he prayed
when he said: 81 invoke the Lord God in
whom I am glad to believe"
David Livingstone, able to conquer the
lion, able to conquer the panther, able to
conquer the savage, yet conquered by tins
delusion, this hallucination, this great
swindle of the ages, so when they find him
dead they find him on his knees.
William E. Gladstone, the strongest in
tellect in England to-day, unable to resist
this chimera. this fallacy, this delusion OF
the Christian religion. goes to the house of
God every Sabbath, and often, at the invi
tation of the rector, reads the prayers to
the people
0, if those mighty intellects are over.
borne by this delusion, what chance is
there for you and for mel
Besides that, / have noticed that first
rate infdels can not be depended on for
steadfastness in the proclamation of their
sentiments. Goethe, leading skeptc,
was 80 wrought upon by this Christianity
that in a weak moment he cried out: my
J belief in the Bible has saved me in my
literary and moral life."
Rousseau, one of the most eloquent
champions Of infidelIty, spending his whole
life warning against Christianity, cries
out: 1.-THE majesty Of the Scriptures
amaZes me.n
} Altamont, the notorious infdel-one
would think he would be safe against this
delusion of the Christian religion. Oh, no
| oil IL
days in the last hour of his life he cried
out: ''Oh, Thou blasphemed but most in
dulgent Lord God hell itself is refuge If
it hide me from Thy frownp'
Voltaire, the most talented infidel thu
world ever saw, writing two hundred ant
, fifty publications, and the most of then
! spiteful against Christianity, himself the
most notorious hbertine of the country
! one would have thought he could have
been depended upon for steadfastness in
the advocacy of intidelity and in the wa,
, against this terrible chimera, this deIusior
, of the Gospel. But no; in his last hour h,
, asks for Chistian burial and asks that they
: give him the sacrament Of the Lord Jesu!
J Christ.
Why, you can not depend upon thes
: irstrate infdels-you can not depend upol
3 their power to resist this great delusion O
Christianity. Thomas Paine, the god o
? modern skeptics, his birthday celebrated
4 in New York and Boston with great en-
, thusiasm-Thomas Paine, the paragon O
! Bible haters; Thomas Paine, about whom
his brother iafiel, William Carver, wrote
in letter which have at my house, say
ing that he drank quart of rum a day
and was too mean and too dishonest t.
pay for it; Thomas Paine, the adoret
3 of modern infidelity; Thomas Paine, who
. stole another mans wife in England and
brought her to this land; Thomas Paine
who was so squalid, and so loathsome, anG
, so drunken, and so profigate, and so beast
ly in his habits, sometimes picked out Of
: the ditch, sometimes too filthy to be picked
> out; Thomas Paine one would hav
3 thought that he could have been depended
on for steadfastness against this great de
fusion. But no. In his dying hour he begs
r the Lord Jesus Christ for mercy.
Powerful delusion, ell~conquering de,u
S sion, earthquaking delusion Of the Chris
9 tian religion. Yea, it goes on, it is SO i'm
pertinent, and it is so overbearing, this chi
Q mera of the Gospel, that having conquered
the great picture galleries of the world
q the old masters and the young mas tiers, a
n t1ww II r. r.